


Whatever I've Got (It Isn't Enough)

by sallysorrell



Category: Sweet (2000), The Mighty Boosh (TV)
Genre: M/M, Other, Pining, Sharing Clothes, Stitch has problems and no idea how to deal with them
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-21
Updated: 2016-05-23
Packaged: 2018-06-03 15:40:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6616147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sallysorrell/pseuds/sallysorrell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When he looks back on it, it really isn't much of a story.  It's a lot of quiet confusion in hazy clubs.  A mess of invisible lives and lies.  With that Sweet boy in the middle, too nice and too pretty for his own good. </p><p>This is the way he and Sweet found each other and figured things out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

When he decided to leave the coach, he gathered his parka, 50p, and a shoulder-bag of rolled up shirts and empty crisp packets.

It was only that morning he decided to leave home, taking along a rushed combination of things he needed and ones that wouldn’t be missed by the rest of the household.  In all his life, he had never been one to snap, but when he awoke too early that morning he felt uncomfortably close.  He was so tied to his routine, and felt desperate to try something new, even if it just meant inventing a new set of rituals to repeat and get sick of.  Anything.

He took a few sleepy steps away from the bus-stop, and found himself caught between two pubs and a decision.  One had neon lights, the other had an obviously handpainted sign for live music.

Done.

He found himself inside, purposely approaching the nearest table with an open seat.  A slim woman in a yellow paisley scarf sat at the opposing barstool, head bobbing in time to the music.

He preferred talking to women, based on the fact he did not prefer them for anything further.

So, he asked to use the seat across from her.  She nodded happily and introduced herself as ‘Pete’ in a voice only slightly lower than he’d imagined.

“Sorry,” he said, even though the mistake was restrained to his thoughts.

“What for?” Pete smiled, making him feel uncomfortable.

He never would’ve approached the table, if he knew - or could guess slightly better - that the figure was a man.  But Pete was still smiling at him, the box of matches trying to spark their conversation.  He sat and rested his arms on the table.

“Never mind,” he said.  He focused on the music, instead, and decided to ask Pete if he preferred the original to the cover being performed in front of them, as nice as it was.

“Swear to god,” Pete said, “no one here knows it’s even a cover band.  But it ain’t bad, you’re right.”

He smiled.  Pete asked his name.

 _Starting over_.  

He hadn’t thought of one yet.  A waste of eight hours on a bus.  What _had_ he done?

He had twirled the coin between his fingers, in the parka pocket.  He had tugged some of the fur out of the hood’s lining, too, to pass the time.  He thought about how he’d left his key to the flat on his mum’s car tyre; she always checked them before work and wouldn’t miss it, only him.

But he hadn’t thought of anything to call himself.  He shrugged and led a noise from the back of his throat for Pete to interpret.

“It’s alright,” Pete assured, “lots of people do lots of shady jobs ‘round here.  You don’t have’ta tell me.”

“Sorry,” he began, tilting his head, “what did you think I was doing?”

Pete shook his head.

“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Yeah.”

After the song finished, Pete turned to his new friend and asked if he could do with a drink.

“I’m not sure I wanna _know_ what you do,” Pete continued, “you look _well_ tired.  That’s the nicest way I can say it.”

Pete offered him a chance at his half-full pint, but he held up his hand to decline.

“Tap water’s fine,” he said. “And I don’t do anything…?  I just got here.  I moved, is all I’ve done.  I wanted to get further south so I could stay with my sister, but I couldn’t get a cheaper ticket.”

Pete watched him eagerly, leaning his head on one hand and continuing to smile as if all of this was the best news of his life.

“You need a place to stay?”

He sipped the water and resisted the urge to choke on it.

“Probably could do with a job first.”

“Let’s go, then,” Pete took his wrists, sliding his fingers beneath the coat, and dragged him through the maze of tables and barstools.

* * *

He was expecting a lot worse, or at least a lot different.  But that was the way his mind worked.  It was easily hung up in dark alleys or on gleaming chains.  Pete ran with him past these, to a charming and warm little flat above a shop, brimming with vinyl, potted plants, and leopard print.  He tried his hardest to feel at home, even though it disagreed with his personal collection of cassettes and faded plaid.  

 _Sweet Music_ , the signs said.

“It’s my name,” Pete explained, “Pete Sweet.  Well, Peter.”

“Right.”

It seemed to fit well enough, into the new slot he’d made in his mind.   _Sweet_ , but in an indulgent and sticky sort of way; honey, perhaps, or pollen.  He felt he owed the man something, just to pay for this brief interaction.  For any time they spent together.  Sweet.

Then he told himself he could’ve come up with something clever and rhyming and innocuous on his coach journey, but shook his head to clear the thought.

Pete explained that it was rightfully his mother’s name and his mother’s shop, but he borrowed both and promised to look after them when she left Camden three years back.  This did not seem to bother him.

“I _could_ use your help,” Pete continued, “cos I trust your taste in music.”

“Oh, yeah,” he said.

This made him feel more comfortable than anything else Pete had told him, for some reason.  He slithered out of his parka and draped it over the side of the couch Pete had swept clear for him.

“What’s, uh, what’s your mum do?” Pete asked.  A perfect conversation for two twenty-somethings, both so lost at living on their own.

“Everything,” he said flatly.  His hands were drawn to the fur on the hood-lining, which he plucked at for inspiration.  After a while he said “This,” as an example.

There was a tiny patch of slightly greyer fluff, which he lifted to reveal was sewn there.

“That’s genius!” Pete sounded genuinely intrigued, “my mum would’a just told me to stop, but yours stitched more on for you.  That’s what _I_ would’a done; it’s nice.”

Pete had touched no less than a dozen things during their short conversation, including the cushion between them, several different album sleeves, and the branches of the bamboo on the end-table.  He reached forward to brush his new friend’s arms, both at once, before snagging the hood of the parka and plunging his fingers into the fur.

“You can w-wear it, if you like,” he offered, still blindly indebted.  Pete was happy to oblige, giggling at how low the sleeves fell from his arms.  He rolled them up, and offered to make tea.

“Cheers, Stitch,” he said as he hovered toward the kettle.

He imagined himself saying ‘cheers’ back, only after they’d clinked their teacups together, at the promise of starting over.

 _Stitch_.

Stitch did feel at home, when Pete returned to the couch, scooted into the centre, and passed him a cup of tea.  He found it very difficult to talk about both his wants and his needs; he marvelled as Pete leaned close to his face and interpreted them more clearly than even his mother could’ve managed.  The difference was that she would remain quiet and shoot the look back at him, while Pete was content to continue the conversation as normal.

“Dunno if you’d fit on the couch,” Pete said, to the heavy way Stitch was blinking, “D’you wanna try my bed tonight?”

“Why are you doing all this?” Stitch began.  He wanted to add ‘do you like me?’ but thought it sounded too childish, and avoided ‘are you coming on to me?’ for the opposite reason.

Pete shrugged.

“Cos I like you,” he said, in the exact tone Stitch wanted to suppress, “And - I mean - I’d sleep on the couch.  I didn’t mean--  Just ‘til we find you a place to stay, yeah?  That’s what you really need.”

“I don’t mind the couch,” Stitch said, feeling guilty again.

“Alright,” Pete said, “See y’ in the morning, yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Stitch was momentarily disturbed - when Pete flicked off the lights and left him to nestle his face into the armrest - because he did not feel at all like he’d started over again.  

He felt like he’d been here all his life.


	2. Chapter 2

The feeling was stronger the next morning, nearly commissioning a physical presence in his chest.  It was prodded by tangled little dreams, of Pete hiring him for something entirely different, and of him spending the night in Pete’s bed only because he’d been tied there.  He wasn’t sure these were things he wanted, but he was sure he didn’t want to live alone.

Pete woke him gently, patting the borrowed parka down over the armrest, apologising for not offering blankets, and rushing to find them something for breakfast.

“And I talked to m’ mate Dave las’ night,” he said as he rummaged through the cabinets for something other than cereal, “He lets that block of flats ‘round the corner.  Said he may have something for you, first of next month.”

Stitch thought seriously about talking up the few things he knew how to cook.  Maybe an omelette?  He could tell Pete he was from a respected French family of chefs.  He could do whatever he wanted.

And yet.

He made a small and sleepy noise, and stretched so that his wrists edged over the armrest.  Pete watched him before returning his attention to the cabinets.

“And he wants to meet you, as well, after all I told him.  Said there’s a good place for dancing up King Street, if you wanna go with us.”

“I’ll make breakfast,” Stitch said, in exchange for the jumble of thoughts fighting for attention.  When had Pete had time to tell a friend _all_ about him?  How much did he know, anyway?  And why didn’t this wake Stitch up?

He slipped and said something about being French on his mother’s side, because Pete was giving him an impossibly bright version of the smile he’d met last night, now fully rested and well practised.

“Dunno if I’ve got eggs or cheese,” Pete said, “bit skint.  That’n I don’t cook much.”

“Yeah, gathered that,” Stitch said, surveying the cabinets over Pete’s shoulder.  He wanted to say something about how it couldn’t be healthy to live off of Pete’s assortment of sugary foods, but he also assumed Pete couldn’t be healthy, grinning away as he was.

There were some ‘living alone’ tasks Pete was quite good at.  Making phone calls, dropping his rent cheque off on the exact day it was due, and making it to work on time everyday even if his office was just downstairs from his bedroom.  Of course, there were also some he could not do, like remember to lock the shop door whenever he went out, or make himself any meals beyond cold cereal and sandwiches.

Stitch rarely forgot to lock a door, and had watched his mum cook enough to manage passably.  Not with the current contents of Pete’s kitchen, but soon enough.  Was he already imagining spending more mornings there, after more nights?  Yes, he was.  He was hopeless.

He shook his head, which didn’t help.

“Are you really gonna make us breakfast?” Pete slid out of Stitch’s way, and let him sift around for ingredients.

“Are you really taking me _dancing_?” he said, to a box of Frosties.

“Well yeah.”

“That wasn’t a joke?”

“No, course not.  You said you were up for anything.”

“...When’d I say that?”

He recalled the moment immediately after asking, something from a dream where Pete’s hands were sliding under his shirt, up his spine.  Stitch spoke more while he was asleep than while he was awake, by a wide margin.

“Oh,” he rushed to add, “yeah, that’d be fine.”

It didn’t help that Pete chose to add he had both a bathtub and a shower in the flat, if Stitch wanted.

“Okay,” he said, trying not to think too seriously about the reasons Pete picked him up.  Or about what he expected from following him.  

* * *

Dave was alright, in the end.  He was easy enough to talk to, and he did have an open room.  Something about his sister wanting to move out.  Stitch wasn’t really listening.

Because the dancing was alright, too.  He was watching Pete, buzzing about the place and chatting with everyone, with only his hair visible as he bobbed through the crowd.  He arrived with Stitch, hesitantly holding his arm to show him inside, then dropping it to introduce Dave.  

Stitch had offered to help Dave’s sister move out, but Dave said she was already living out of a suitcase and not much else.  He remembered that part, because he’d nodded and said the same for himself.  But Dave shook his head, shared a short look with Pete, and then told them both to have a nice night.

He had twenty nice nights at Pete’s place - with eleven nice showers and numerous not-as-nice dreams - before moving into the block across the street.  Pete liked seeing him every day for work.  And for lunch, and sometimes for tea.  Stitch did a lot of cooking and Pete did a lot of talking.

“Dave’s sister’s in town tonight,” he said. “She’s gotta pick some bits up from him, or something.”

“Oh yeah?”

Pete nodded and played with the peas on his plate.

“What’s that about?” Stitch asked.

“Hmm?”

“ _That_ ,” he tried to mimic Pete’s expression, but ended up just gesturing toward Pete’s face with his fork.

“‘S me bein’ nervous is all,” Pete explained, “I’ve never met her, and I’m not too good at talking to girls.”

“Oh,” said Stitch, “I’m… I’m not either.”

But his face, at least to Pete, suggested this was untrue.  Stitch maintained that he was equally bad at talking to them, but probably had more practise at it.  Pete’s eyes glimmered.

“So you’ll come with me?”

And that’s how Stitch found himself back at the questionable club, with Pete telling him that dancing would help them both feel less nervous.  For Pete, being nervous meant giggling and shutting his eyes and trying to elicit whispered advice from Stitch, who remained twitchy and very uninterested in helping Pete find ways to walk away from him.

Pete’s hands suddenly clamped down over Stitch’s, along the sides of his thighs where they tended to stick when he didn’t know what else to do with them.

“What?” Stitch said, pulling back.

“I just saw Dave at the door!”

“Alright, so…?”

“You’re right,” Pete sighed, and patted his hands down once before removing them, “we’ll just go back to dancing.  Play it cool, yeah.”

His definition of ‘cool’ did not line up at all with either of their styles of dance or dress, or expression or composure.  But Poppy, as they quickly discovered, was not concerned.

Stitch thought there was something wrong with him, at first, when he didn’t see her.  His first step was always to blame himself for problems or confusion; miscommunication and blank faces were specialties of his.  After deciding his face was indeed somewhere on the way to ‘shocked’, he considered how much he’d had to drink.  Not enough, really.  And he’d only left once to the toilets, leaving Pete in charge of his current drink.  Pete rarely mixed things in, and always asked him first anyway.

That left everyone else being wrong.  

There was _no one_ sitting between them and Dave at the booth.  Pete said ‘hello’ to no one, charmed and chatted up no one, and left in a rush with _no one_.

Stitch found himself caught between many small, tangled nets, none of which could hold him completely.  His pint was new and nearly full, and Pete had left his own behind as well.  He did not want to talk to Dave; he didn’t know where to begin other than ‘your family all need help’ which he was fairly sure would be inappropriate.  And he did _not_ want to think about what Pete was up to at the flat, which almost certainly was.  So he sat and he sipped and he let his brain pound pointlessly at the walls of speech.

“I should go,” he said after a while.  Dave glanced at him, as if he’d forgotten Stitch was still there.  Stitch usually found blending in to be acceptable, until he was ignored in favour of an _invisible woman_.

“Yeah,” Dave stood, partially, but sat back down and let Stitch mirror this, “I should tell you, though, first.”

 _Finally_ , thought Stitch.  But he received very little reassurance.

“I didn’t think they’d get on so well, or I wouldn’t’ve brought her, honestly.  I’m really sorry.  I told him she was short and ginger ‘n’ all - she _has_ just dyed her hair - cos you _know_ he’s more into lanky dark-haired types.”

“ _What_?”

“Well I don’t want to wreck what you’ve got going now, do I?”

Stitch did leave, then, with a quiet ‘it’s alright’ and a puzzled ‘I _need_ to go.’


End file.
